APPS & SITES

Bali Fun

This photo below is from Bali and it just reminds me that I need to go back there! It was a very peaceful place… I’m into yoga and everything, and I found it very easy to get into the flow there. Maybe that was just in my head, and that seems like an arbitrary place to be.

Daily Photo – Picking Rice

Wow, that looks like back-breaking work. I find it challenging just to bend over to tie my shoes. It would be like tying your shoes, standing up, taking one step, then untying your shoes, then taking another step and tying your shoes again. I actually tried it for a while… I had a guy show me how to do it. One of the strangest things that I guess I didn't realize is that you are barefooted the whole time. It's really gooey in there… but it was nice to experience something so foreign to me but what millions of people do!

Hot Gadget Recommendation

See the speaker in the Day 0 video below? That’s the JBL Pulse 2 Speaker. I absolutely love that thing… it’s so fun. Everyone else seems to love it too! That speaker brings the party! 🙂

Daily Photo – Dinner in Bali

What a cool place to have dinner eh? It reminds me of a little beehive or something like that. This is one of the fabulous dinner spots at Mandapa, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve in Bali. The food was amazingly fabulous and at one point, I even got to go back into the kitchen to have a little explore-time with the head chef. It's always so interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes. They were working extra-hard because this night, in particular, there was a huge dinner party where all the General Managers from all the 4 and 5-star resorts from Bali came over to have dinner here. It was kind of a funny story because as I walked by, the GM from the Ritz-Carlton grabbed me to say something. I had a few wines by then, and I ended up telling some really funny story and everyone was laughing. It was all quite ridiculous but fun.

Yoga X

Some of you know I like those Tony Horton videos and I’m into P90x3! There’s a good routine in there called Yoga X that lasts about 30 minutes and is a pretty fun thing. And, like everything else, I’m not really that good at it, but trying to improve all the time.

Daily Photo – Yoga in Bali

Here's yours truly getting my yoga on! And I'm even wearing my Thai fisherman pants… I wore those almost everywhere there. This is in the yoga room in front of a beautiful rolling river at the Ritz-Carlton Mandapa Reserve. It was really nice to get up every morning, do a meditation, then stroll over to the yoga room… what a nice daily habit to get in… Not that I'm always that disciplined, but at least I try, I guess!

Spooky Spotify

Every week, they make me a new playlist to discover called, intrepidly, “Discover Weekly.” They put songs in there I’ve never heard of but usually enjoy. I have strange tastes in music… so how-do-it-know?

Daily Photo – The Volcanoes in Bali from Above

Here's a cool photo I got with the Inspire on a surprise flight. I didn't expect to fly at this exact spot… we kind of randomly pulled over in the middle of the island and decided to take a flight. This was one of the only volcano views I got while there… I didn't get too close to them at all, and there weren't a lot of views I got from the roadside. So it was really cool to get up above the trees and get to see them like this.

More from the Ritz-Carlton in Bali

Daily Photo – The Glass Church in Daylight

Believe it or not, I was too busy to get back in here with my wide-angle lens to get a full shot, so I had to settle for this one, which isn't so bad. Maybe next time when I go back we can make that happen! It's such a cool place inside, and the only way to get its true glory is with a wide-angle lens.

Yoga Every Day

I don’t do yoga and meditation every single day, but I did make sure to have time for it here in Bali. I was on holiday, after all… the least I could do, while doing nothing, was squeeze in a bit of time for that! But I find it’s actually hard to do NOTHING all day long. I am a bit of a busy-body, I guess… yeah but my day would just get filled up with all kinds of nothing-business for some reason, so I found I needed to pre-schedule time for yoga & meditation… otherwise it would never get done! 🙂

Daily Photo – Walking into another paradise

This is the view I saw as I walked into the Mandapa Reserve Bali (a Ritz-Carlton property) at night. There was about a 1-hour car ride here through a magical sunset… and it was all dusky and moody when I arrived. I was totally gobsmacked when I walked in here… So many textures and lights and things to look at, all while being completely calming and relaxing. You can imagine how many hundreds of photos I got of this place, just roaming around and listening to music. Amazing!

A Favorite Feynman Video

I share these with my kids a lot… I’ve read about three of his books and I love the way he talks about things. Like, for example, did you know trees don’t grow out of the ground? Trees mostly grow out of the air.

Daily Photo – A beautiful chapel in Bali from Above

See that amazing white chapel down there? It's hard to tell from this angle, but the whole front part of it is glass and opens up onto the Balinese ocean. It was just remarkable inside! I only got in once to take photos, but I thought this perspective was especially interesting. I got this while I was with the Ritz-Carlton in Bali and taking a group of orphans around.

My Current Quadcopter Setup

Currently, I have an Inspire One and a Phantom 3. I keep the Phantom 3 fueled up and ready inside of a backpack for treks. As for the Inspire One, I keep that in my home with propellors on, camera on, and ready to fly. It makes it easy for me just to step out the front door and get some quick shots without a lot of setup time.

Daily Photo – Rice Fields in Bali from Above

Unfortunately, my Phantom 3 was out-of-commission when I went to Bali so I had to lug the big Inspire 3 out there… it's a bit of a pain to travel with and launch, but after its up, it flies beautifully. I had a strange problem because I had sort of a bum Apple Lightning cable to connect it to my iPad. I was getting the dreaded “No Connection” message… and I had no idea what was causing it. Only later when I tried a different cord did I realize the problem!

Updated Burning Man Plan

This next time I’m gonna go with my friend Rene, and he and I are gonna bring along Jonatas, our Brazilian developer with us to cook us 3 hot Brazilian meals per day, clean our RV, and get all my camera equipment ready! I’m very excited about this plan… surely it has some weak points, but I don’t think so!

Daily Photo – Coming out of my room at night in Bali

Can you believe the view out of my front door in Bali? This was one of the rooms with its own private pool at the Mandapa Reserve Ritz Carlton… you can see my pool out there, just waiting for a little skinny dip action! Actually, it was a room within a room, as there is another separate living room there to the left and then another door that is actually the exit to the villa. Wow what a place… I gotta get back there some day! 🙂

The first time I was with children from Indonesia was about five years ago at Borobudur. I’ve always found Indonesia people to be INCREDIBLY warm and open-hearted. And especially the kids! So this time, while I was staying at the Ritz-Carlton in Bali, I talked to the General Manager and we arranged to have a group of orphans come over and we could spend a few hours on a photo walk to talk about creativity and life and all that stuff! It was really great.. super great kids. We started with a little photo walk on the beach and all around the property, then ended up back inside for some snacks and a little presentation of places from around the world. We had a Q&A about art and creativity and everything… wow that was fun. Thanks again! Here are some photos from the afternoon and evening!